Oltchim agrees to acquire the petrochemicals business of Romania’s oil major Petrom

12-Feb-10

After months of negotiations, state-owned Romanian chemicals producer Oltchim has finally agreed to acquire Arpechim, the petrochemicals business of Romania’s biggest oil and gas group Petrom, along with its workforce of 560 at Pitesti, as per prw.com. The move will consolidate the country’s petrochemical operations and allow Petrom to concentrate on its core business. The deal ends the threat of redundancy hanging over the workers of the 200,000 tons ethylene and 95,000 tons propylene plant, that has been idled for over a year. Fixed assets being transferred to Oltchim include units for pyrolysis and extraction of aromatics, low density and high density polyethylene, storage tanks and an area of 150 hectares of associated land. Oltchim will pay around €13 mln for the assets, stocks of oil and petrochemicals and certain Petrom investments. Oltchim and Petrom signed a debt restructuring agreement with Oltchim’s historical debts to the oil and gas group amounting in December 2009 to more than €112m, will be repaid over three years.